CiM Mulberry is a juicy shade of purple with a bit of a magenta leaning to it. It's dreamy to use - so buttery soft and nice to melt, but a few of my rods also had a tendency to splinter, which is a sharp jolt back to reality when a piece lands on the back of your hand.

In terms of its colour, it seems to me like a combination of Plum and Eggplant. It's more opaque than Plum (more like Eggplant) but it is pinker than Eggplant, with more of the soft pinkish-purple of Plum.

Silver goes an odd brownish colour on top of Mulberry, but otherwise pretty much stays put. When the silver is reduced and encased, it gets blue patches in it. This encased Mulberry/Silver Leaf bead on the right cracked, but it cracked right down the mandrel line which means it might just have been my own stupid fault. However, it also might mean that Mulberry doesn't like being encased with Effetre 006 Clear. More experimentation would be required to know for sure which.

On top of Mulberry, silver glass develops colour really well. Mulberry also seems to do a weird thing that pushes the silver glass away from the edges of the bead. If you look at these two beads, I rolled them in silver glass frit exactly the same way I usually, do, but there is almost no silver glass bits near the bead holes at all. Strange.

The TerraNova2 got beautiful colour on top of Mulberry. I sort of already said that, but I feel like saying it again. It's hard to find these good 'accelerating' bases for silver glass, so when I find one I get pretty happy about it.

Mulberry is sort of reactive, but the reactions are not very interesting when other colours are used on top of it. It has a dispersing, watercolouring impact when stringerwork is done on top of it which makes the reactions sort of hard to read.

Mulberry is very interesting, though, on top of Copper Green and Opal Yellow. In the bead on the right, you can see how the dots of Mulberry on top of Copper Green resulted in a dark transparent outline, then a whiteish ring and finally the purple of the Mulberry shyly peeking out of the middle. It causes Opal Yellow to curdle underneath it fairly violently and spring up in big halos. These two effects are very cool and worthy of additional study.

Here are some fun beads with Mulberry.

This is Mulberry over a core of something blue (don't remember) and then subsequently encased with more things blue. The rose murrini are Effetre Bubblegum and Kugler Golden.

Mulberry is used in the base of this bead, over top of a base of Dark Violet and is then encased with Light Aqua (I think).

Here I've mixed Mulberry with other colours, however I don't remember which ones. I think some Kugler Golden was involved, and some Bubblegum or Pink Alabastro. The resulting hand-mixed colour was used to encase a dark violet core. The stripe of purple down the right-hand side of the bead is Mulberry.

CiM Journey is a pale grey-lavender colour. I found Journey to be a little less user-friendly than some of the other recent CiM transparents because of its tendency to boil. Working it up high in the flame helps manage the boiling problem, but on the whole I prefer to use colours that don't need this kind of special treatment.

Reducing CiM Journey changes its colour from greyish-lavender to greyish-brown.

Journey and silver have an interesting relationship. Journey turns a golden brown colour with silver, as you can see in all three of these beads. In the centre bead, the reduced and encased silver on top of Journey develops a very pretty purple/blue colour reaction. The bad news is that the centre bead cracked. I'm not sure if it was the encasing or if it was the silver or if it was combination of the two, but there are hairline cracks crazily spreading throughout this bead.

In the bead on the right, you can see how yellow/brown silver foil looks under a layer of Journey.

Journey is a fairly good base for silver glass. The centre bead here is exceptionally vivid and pretty. In the bead on the right I tried Journey as a base for silver glass frit stringer, and the results are sort of unspectacular. The interesting thing about this bead was that it was encased, and like the encased silver leaf bead (above) it also cracked.

On top of Journey, Tuxedo thins out and looks pretty purple.

Copper Green, when used with Journey, develops a brownish lustre. This is evident in both of the beads above. On top of Copper Green, the Journey dots and lines look very precise, and appear to have a dark outline around them. This did not happen with Journey on top of the other colours I tested it with.

Journey did not have memorable or noteworthy reactions with either Opal Yellow or Ivory, however it behaved interestingly when used on top of Peace. You can see in the bead on the right that in the middle of the Journey dots and lines, some blackness has gathered. I'm not sure if this is the result of working too hot or if my flame was a bit dirty at the end of my propane, so if you have some Journey, you should give it a try.

I don't have any fun beads with Journey, because I ran out of it a little too quickly. I will come back and add some pictures if I make any more beads with it.

August 18, 2011

When I got the Marble rods, I found myself asking "How is Marble different from Marshmallow?" because the Marble rods are a similar semi-opaque white colour. After melting the Marble (although never having melted any Marshmallow) it became clear that it is different from Marshmallow in that it does not stay semi-opaque. On the CiM site, Marble is described as a streaky, marble-like white but I didn't get much in the way of streaks. It looks pretty white to me.

So then I felt the need to ask myself "OK then, how is Marble different from White?" since it seemed like I should be asking some questions, questions being the mother of answers and answers being what we are looking for when we test anything.

And sadly, the answer is that I only sort of know, because in spite of all of the testing I've done, I haven't yet bothered to test the staple colours that I test everything else with. This didn't really seem like such a huge oversight until I tested Marble, so I'm a little annoyed with myself. Fortunately for Marble (and for me) it is a very interesting colour, so not having done my homework can only really eat at me so much.

In some of the pictures, Marble has blended right into the background. I'd like to say that I photographed Marble on a white background on purpose to demonstrate its inherent whiteness (or lack thereof) however the truth is that I just didn't think to get out the black plexiglass. I guess the next time I test such a light colour I really should, since some of these beads are sort of hard to make out.

CiM Marble is an opaque white that is very reactive with silver, and has some unusual reactions with other colours as well. It's a fairly stiff colour, and is sort of nice to use because of its smooth consistency.

Marble fumes a yellowish colour when used with silver. You can see the mottled yellow/orange/brown reactions in the bead on the left. You can see the yellow in the middle of the bead on the right, too, where the silver didn't cover the core of the bead. On top of Marble, silver goes a brownish colour as well, but then when it is reduced and encased as in the bead on the right, it takes on blueish and pinkish tints and goes pretty shiny. This is a pretty reaction (or at least it would be if the yellow had stayed hidden).

I had mixed results for Marble with silver glass. I really like the way the reduced silver glass behaved on Marble, and the sheen reducing the silver glass gave to the marble is really interesting in the bead on the left. I swear I make all of these test beads the same way, and I had great success with Midnight just the day after I made these, so instead of blaming myself for this one I am going to say that Marble is much nicer as a base for reducing silver glass than it is for striking silver glass. One interesting feature of the bead with TerraNova2 frit is the way the Marble came up in little halos around the frit. I love that effect.

Tuxedo
I'm not really sure what was going on here, so you are going to have to work this out for yourself if you are interested. In the bead on the left, my Marble stringer got a lot of dark 'gunge' in it, and I have no idea if this is from a reactions or if it is because I was coming to the end of my propane. It's sort of suspicious that the Marble did this on top of all of the colours EXCEPT copper green, but weirder things have happened. In any case, the 'gunge' seemed to only fill the centres of the dots and lines on Tuxedo, which means that that the Marble separated on top of it. If you try it, I predict you will either get two different consistencies of white, or that you will get what I got. Let me know :)

When Tuxedo is used on top of Marble, the Marble rises up around it in little white halos.

Copper Green
On top of Copper Green, Marble separates a little, and when Copper Green is used on top of Marble, white halos rise up around it as well. Copper Green stays an odd, shiny yellowish colour with Marble.

Opal Yellow
When Opal Yellow is used with Marble, it seems inclined to blush pink. On top of Opal Yellow (apart from where it turned grey) the Marble seems to acquire some of Opal Yellow's pinkish yellowness.

Ivory & Peace
It's difficult to really discern anything meaningful from what I did on top of Ivory and Peace with Marble, and from the complete wash that was Ivory and Peace on top of Marble, but this seems to be the area of the bead that received the most blackening. There's not a lot of point in ever attempting white-on-white, so I'll probably never do this again so we may not find out if there's anything more to it.

I made some fun murrini with Marble (although I've just realized I didn't take any pictures of it *sigh*), and also used it underneath Midnight in my Midnight bead. On the whole, I liked Marble. It's got character.

My three pounds of this colour are safely on their way to me, so it's safe to post about how utterly AWESOME this colour is. I'm kidding, kind of. I haven't delayed posting this because I'm a mean hoarder, but seriously, I don't ever want to run out of this colour so I will be adding to that stash until its gone, and if CiM doesn't make more I think I'll weep.

CiM Midnight is a very stiff transparent colour, sort of like Leaky Pen, however it does not have Leaky Pen's tendency to boil, pit and spark in the flame. It is very dark, even over a core of Clear, and is wonderfully reactive with other colours but stable with silver.

In the bead on the left, the silver has stayed silver after melting it into the surface of Midnight and just sort of sat there. This is very similar to what happened when I did this test with Dark Grass Green and Ink Blue / Pale Ink Blue.

When the silver leaf is melted into Midnight and then reduced and encased, some dark blue leaches up out of the Midnight into the silver. I think the yellowing is mostly due to the Clear reacting with the silver.

On top of Silver Foil, you can see that Midnight is a dark purplish blue colour. It does not change the colour of the silver underneath it.

Like Dark Grass Green and Ink Blue / Pale Ink Blue, Midnight makes a wonderful base colour for silver glass. It behaves more like the ink blues in that the TerraNova2 frit tends more toward the purples, pinks and blues. With Dark Grass Green, TerraNova2 frit is much more colourful, but I love these deep purple and blue tones I got with Midnight. Midnight does not really bear any other similarities to these colours though in terms of reactions.

My reduction frit in the middle bead looks beautifully vibrant on top of Midnight.

Midnight is only somewhat successful used as frit stringer. I didn't expect it to work at all because a) it is so dark and b) it is blue, so this was a bit of a surprise.

Tuxedo
Not much reaction expected here, so not much disappointment experienced.

Copper Green
On top of Midnight, copper green separates slightly and goes faintly pinkish. This reaction also occurs when Midnight is used on top of Copper Green -- the Copper Green is a mottled pink and green patchwork in the bead on the left.

Opal Yellow
Opal Yellow rises up in a halo around Midnight dots and stringer work, which is a very fun effect. On top of Midnight, Opal Yellow develops a reaction ring inside dots and stringer lines, but doesn't really 'separate'. I like this combo very much.

Ivory
When Midnight is used on top of Ivory, it appears to be a dark olive brown colour. When Ivory is used on top of Midnight, the edges get brownish and dirty looking and the Ivory seems to separate.

Peace
The reaction between Peace and Midnight is the same as the reaction between Midnight and Opal Yellow, only slightly less pronounced.

In these beads, I've layered Midnight with other colours. The rose cane is Effetre Spring Willow and Midnight.

I'm going to admit right off the bat that I really don't like this colour very much, but I think it's because it is disinclined to look nice in the kinds of beads I customarily make. It is also a really bright colour, and semi-opaque, two categories of colour that I find a little challenging. I did manage to figure out a way to make this colour work for me, which you will see if you read on.

CiM Submarine is sort of a loud yellow with greenish overtones, and is not really very opaque. It's also, however, not very semi-opaque and it would be more accurate to describe it as a 'streaky opal' colour. While working, Submarine is a little sensitive to boiling, although you can't really tell in the finished beads. Working a little higher up in the flame solves this problem.

Submarine is a limited run, so if you like what you see here know that it will not be available forever.

When silver leaf is melted into the surface of Submarine, it turns a dark brown colour. This is very similar to how silver reacts with Ivory, however since Submarine is of a completely different consistency, instead of curdling and webbing, Submarine just changes colour. With the addition of silver, the colour of Submarine deepens and becomes somewhat more subdued. Good to know :)

When the silver is reduced and encased, it becomes an earthy brown colour.

Silver glass frit reacts and develops colour on top of Submarine nicely, but the colour of Submarine doesn't really match most silver glass colours. I particularly like the thin whiteish lines that developed around the edges of the reduction frit in the bead on the right.

Tuxedo bleeds into Submarine, turning it a greenish colour.

Copper Green goes very pinkish and shiny when used with Submarine. A reciprocal dark line reaction develops between these two colours which is pretty interesting. I actually really like the left side of this bead, with the Submarine on top of Copper Green.

Submarine bleeds a little into Opal Yellow (you can see yellow outlines around the stringer work on the left side of this bead), and a faint dark line that looks like a shadow sprang up around the Opal Yellow stringer work on the right-hand side of this bead.

Submarine bleeds into Ivory. If you enlarge this picture, you will see what I mean. The bleeding is pretty uniform, and surrounds the stringer work on both sides of the bead.

With Peace, the same bleeding effect happens as with Ivory, only it is more pronounced. The Peace stringer lines on the right side of this bead looks more yellow than white.

It is really hard for me to make nice beads with bright colours, and this one was very challenging for me.

Here is all I was able to manage. I prefer the Submarine inside other colours in cane where it is not quite as livid. In the bead on the left, it is the middle of the cane used in the bead's core, but is also the yellow around the 'wings'. In the bead on the right, the whole bead was made on a base of submarine with some of the cored cane, a twistie and some SiS.

Glass Colour Properties

About the Reaction Index

This index of reactions, or 'neat effects', is a work in process, and organizes the reactions I have observed in my test beads. I do not claim to have 'invented' any of these reactions, nor do I consider myself any kind of authority on glass reactions. In many cases, I have made up names that suit me to describe the reactions, and I'll continue to do that unless I happen to learn what it is supposed to be called.

I am a student of glass, and am taking a fairly scientific approach to my relationship with it. The results of that experimentation are here as a reference for anyone who is interested.